My Favorite Philly GM

I meant to point this out yesterday, but Tom Heckert is my favorite GM in the town. Ok...ok...ok...I hear you. I know the pickings are slim once you factor in Billy King and Paul Holmgren, but my admiration for Mr. Heckert is mainly due to the fact that he is such a breath of fresh air in the Eagles' organization. Take a look at some of these comments from him in yesterday's Daily News:

"In Miami, it was strictly football. Obviously, I was working with Don Shula and Jimmy Johnson where they were very strong: 'I want this guy, just get it done. I don't want to hear that this guy is overpaid. I don't even want to talk about that. It's not going to happen. I want him, you get him. But Joe [Banner], he made it perfectly clear that we're going to talk about this stuff, and we're going to decide as an organization what's the best thing for the football team, and we're not going to do crazy things. Obviously, we've gone out and we've spent a lot of money on people, [like Jevon] Kearse... but it's not going to be a thing where we're just going to grab this guy, this guy and this guy and deal with the situation later. They were very upfront with that, and I respect that."

Wow...someone actually verbalized what we've been theorizing forever. The Bean Counter has a damn big input on personnel. Normally, this would scare the shit out of me, but based upon the success this team has had during the Reid tenure, I guess Banner knows what he's doing.

In any event, can you see Andy Reid or Joe Banner using such honesty when speaking to the press? I sure can't.

Well, it's pretty clear that the one benefit to Big Red's leave of absence is that we're getting more of Heckert and less of Reid's evasive statements. I just hope Banner and Reid don't put a gag order on this guy.

In closing, I have to share this statement from Heckert. In my opinion, it's an instant classic:

"I've had opportunities to go places and I'm very comfortable with the situation. To have complete control and everything like that, that's all great. But as long as I have say in what we do, that's fine. Last year [2005], I think that was my first losing season in the NFL. That means something to me. Everybody wants to say, 'Hey, I could go [somewhere else] and take over and we're going to be Super Bowl champs in 2 years.' But, in my opinion, I've got to be sure about that before I go. Because losing sucks, and I don't care how much money you make. It's miserable."